look at those gypsys hitting eachother!

We went to Church San Lorenzo with our art history class last week, so here's some photos of things! This is the outside of the back of the apse which is pretty but the front is really plain because Michelangelo was supposed to do the facade but the project got cancelled because a prominent Medici died and they put him to work on a funerary chapel inside instead of the facade, which they were also the patrons for of course.



a cool baroque reliquary inside the church.



We went straight to the Medici chapel to talk about it first, and it's unfortunate that it's pretty unfinished because the tombs Michelangelo did make are pretty awesome. These side tombs of Giuliano and Lorenzo the younger(s) feature the times of day (Night, Day, Dawn and Dusk) as ametaphor for how time took these two men in their prime. PRETTY GREAT MIKE. A PRETTY
NOVEL IDEA.

This tomb was for Giuliano and Lorenzo the Magnificent who were buried in this chapel long before Michelangelo started work on it and their tomb is obvs super mega unfinished.


We moved onto a later chapel called the Chapel of the Princes, whch sadly had scaffolding around it, but you can see how crazy awesome baroqueness it is anyway.




here's a scale shot. Those tombs are like cars, and they were set at least a foot above me.


Then we went into the Laurentian library, here's Ricardo waiting to go inside.


But all my pictures of it are really crappy. Suffice it to say it has one of the best collections of old rare manuscripts in the world, none of which you can see, but the library is small and pretty.

This is the inside of San Lorenzo itself, done in a typical Brunelleschi Florentine style with the pietra serena and white washed walls.


Brunelleschi did the sacristy too and sometimes Michelangelo's chapel is called the new sacristy because the design is based off of Brunelleschi's plan but it was never a sacristy. Anyway here's the old sacristy.




The view from the old sacristy into the transcept. All these photos were taken despite the fact that photos are prohibited, so you have to be sneaky and take pictures around corners like turning the corner with a gun in a videogame!


Lastly I'll leave you with Helen in front of a giant fresco by Bronzino.

L'Opere dell Duomo

We also went to the Duomo Museum with class! Hooray for long lectures standing on your feet with no laptop to potentially distract you from listening to things you already know! Anyway, the museum holds the original sculptures from the facade of the Duomo, the ones outside are now copies. I don't know what a lot of these are because we only covered certain ones and I didn't have time to look because we had to keep up with Helen speed-demon Waterson.


This looked like a tondo portrait of someone who helped with the architecture, or the planning, or maybe the personification of a guild because he's chiseling out the ground plan of the church.


An early 1200's annunciation that was on the facade.


Also from the late Gothic period, but I don't know what.



Donatello's St.one-of-the-evangelists that heavily influenced Michelangelo's Moses (which DID go on the Julius tomb).


An early Adam and Eve.



One of the original Gates of Paradise panels! The others are currently under restoration and unification.


This is Michelangelo's second to last Pieta and the real reason we came to the museum, good thing too, because it was on the midterm, which by the way we supes ridiculously aced. Like, we fracking KILLED that sucka. Helen Waterson was in awe.



The best for last, kind of, I did love the Mike, let's say the most anticipated for last because I knew it was here and I got excited for it. Donatello's Mary Magdalene. Epic. And truly deserving of that word.

La Accademia

We went to the Accademia with class and these are the pictures we got. It was a ragingly long lecture (about 3 hrs) for what is a actually a very small museum, here are for sure the highlights:


Michelangelo's Captives, originally meant for the rather pagan design of Pope Jlius II's tomb, but never finished because Michelangelo moved onto other projects and then never got back to it. That's not like him at all of course... cough.


They're in the hall which leads up to the David.


The David, and my matching outfit. We're BFFs.


This Bronzino painting is just to the left of the David. It's here because I love Bronzino and this painting is almost as big as the David.

Okonomiyaki Recipe and Thoughts

On friday we ate Okonomiyaki, which you might remember as being the food that Ukyo-chan from Ranma 1/2 cooked with a giant spatula. The word "okonomiyaki" or "お好み焼き" basically means "anything-goes-grilled" and is essentially that--whatever you can imagine mixed with a pancake-like batter and fried on a skillet. The restaurant experience is killer but the concept is basic enough that one can pull it off in the comfort of their own home. I love making pancakes, so this recipe seemed right up my alley. There are infinite ways to make it, but here's what I did:

First mix about a cup of flour with 1/2 cup of water mixed with dashi soup base (seaweed-flavored broth) and salt (although I used miso soup base instead).

Finely chop 1 or 2 leaves of cabbage (stem cut out), along with some welsh onion and garlic, however much you want. Throw the chopped veggies in with the batter. Add corn, seaweed, assorted seafood, and noodles as you see fit. I used imitation crab and soba noodles. Crack an egg over the top, and stir everything up a bit (not too much). Oil and heat up your skillet or pan. Pour the mixture on, and let it cook like you would a pancake. Flip when one side becomes golden-brown (see picture), then cook until all the egg and batter are cooked. Serve with okonomiyaki sauce and bonito flakes (dried fish shavings). Apparently mayo is also a popular topping, but I just can't see that.

The result was both delicious and effectively balanced. Everything I could want in a meal in a convenient patty. My recipe made 2 servings (what you see in the photo is 1 serving)

On a side note, I use the Youtube cooking show "Cooking with Dog" for most of my Japanese recipes. They are very helpful and the recipes are super delish/easy. I'm going to miss the convenience of having an asian food store close by and very cheap, though.

And finally, this is the show Abby and I are watching. It's Wallflower, Christina! Remember reading that? It airs on Channel 6 on Fridays at 10 pm. This was the latest episode. Despite how it looks, these four hotties did not just have an orgy. Actually, maybe they did?

Surprise weather

Carnavale! Viareggio! Idiots! oh my.

So, do you know what you should never do? Never agree to go somewhere, on a trip, that involves some actual travel,like on a train, like to another town, without being the organizer of that trip. I bet you thought "Oh, that doesn't sound good." And you would be right. It is not good. Don't do it. You've been warned.

Our friend Anne invited us to Viareggio which is a nearby coastal town that was supposed to have really awesome Carnavale celebrations. That sounds great! we said, and it's Ricardo's birthday that weekend! said Ricardo. So we agreed. When we got to the train station to supposedly get on this 9:57 am train, not only was there no train at that time, but only half the people who were coming were actually on time so we wouldn't have made this fictitious train if it had been real anyway. No big though, we waited until 11:00 am and got on a train for an hour and a half which is not bad at all.


The train was a fun time even though Sarah (the girl in the mask) was still really drunk from the night before and so was REALLY loud (actually everyone was pretty loud) which is really embarrassing here because everyone is really quiet and only grossawfulstupid American touists are that loud.

When we got to Viareggio we happily rushed out onto the street, and dear readers, it looked like a movie about a third world country and it was really gray and raining even though it had been a beautiful day when we left Florence. Things were not looking up. After we walked around for a while we went into a shop to ask for directions and luckily they told us we were literally on the wrong side of the tracks, so we went back to the station and left through the other exit and it actually looked like a town. We found an old man on the street and Sarah asked him in no words of Italian what was happening with Carnavale. Some other people asked him with Italian words. His response was pretty great.

GET READY.

Carnavale only happens on Sundays.

This, dear readers, is on a Saturday. Kiss, kiss, bang, bang 30 euros to get Ricardo and I to Viareggio. This is Ricardo's effort to make me less angry:


It's wasn't a bad effort actually.

Luckily for you, because you're now feeling my very feelings, so deeply are we connected, and therefore are pretty depressed right now, things got better. We found an open air market and after Ricardo and I got separated from everyone (me getting more angry and depressed) and then found Anne who told us everyone had left us (me getting more angry and depressed) we stopped at a stall that had some vintage clothes and found spectacular things and bought them and I felt better because I love clothes. That was a surprise, right? After that it got even better because the sun came out! And when the sun came out the people came out and it no longer looked like a ghost town from the zombie apocalypse. After a while things finally started happening and even though nothing great happened for Carnavale on Saturday it was still a fair and I decided to have a good time even though it was a colossal waste of money.








This is what I got Ricardo at the vintage stall for his birthday! It's from the Italian military and fits really well and has great pins and Ricardo found a Lire in the pocket and was so excited. He wore on his birthday and everyone told him he looked awesome and great and other nice things so he was pretty happy about himself. Also, Anne decided to take this picture in fron tof this port a potty because it has hearts on it and Ricardo is born on Valentine's Day?


Anne poses with the lady on the ride. FIERCE.

Il Bargello

Art History is pretty fun right? Here's an overview of the Bargello, one of Florence's state museums where we had class last Wednesday. The Bargello is all sculpture and a very nice manageable size, so it's really great just to go for an hour or two.

This is the inner courtyard covered in coats of arms left by past governers who lived there when it was housing provided by the state for those in charge at the moment. Later it was converted into a prison and then a museum. Logical of course. (says Spock)




When you go into the room on the first floor it's kind of chock a block full of sculptures and all the Michelangelos are in there. Logical. This is Michelangelo's Bacchus, which is one of his earliest pieces, and it was highly prized because people felt he had captured the true essence of Bacchus. He's pretty drunk which Michelangelo caught in his off balance stance and dumb look, and he's got a little paunch from too much drinking. I agree with all these things, but I still don't think it's the greatest sculpture. We'll cut him some slack because we're nice like that.


This is a much much later Michelangelo and now he's got it more together. Scholars argue about whether this is Apollo or David but basically they're not really sure who this is or whether there was a commission or not. There's a lot of reasons why they think it might be one of these two but basically, he's standing on a lump that hasn't been carved which some argue could be Goliath's head and others say could be the sun, as Apollo was the sun god, and he could be reaching for a sling or a bow (with arrows).


This is a terrible picture of an awesome clay sketch of a personification of a cave by Giambologna. I really really love how crazy and bedraggled and swamp monster he looks.


Here's Donatello's original St.George from the facade of Orsanmichele. Charming as usual.


and Donatello's David! which was so so so so fabulous as always.


Verochio's David is all right too. We'll give him some credit.


I love Renaissance busts, so here's one of Battista Sforza, who was married to Federico da Montefeltro who was the duke of Urbino and Piero della Francesca painted their portraits together. even though she was already dead.



and so concludes my deep and intellectual sum up of Il Bargello skipping over most of the pieces and not really giving anyone a comprehensive analysis of the works. Excellence, no?